


Let’s Get This Over With

by CrackheadMossMan



Category: HLVRAI - Fandom, Half Life VR But The AI Is Self Aware, Half-Life
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Body Horror, Guilt, M/M, Nihilanth!Benrey, This may be kind of shitty idk lmao, benrey is based off the nihilanth, kind of a sequel to Stitches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2020-08-25
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:07:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26099101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrackheadMossMan/pseuds/CrackheadMossMan
Summary: Benrey knew what was coming since the beginning. He accepted it a long time ago. Gordon however, is conflicted about how to finish the boss fight.
Relationships: Benrey/Gordon Freeman
Comments: 6
Kudos: 149





	Let’s Get This Over With

_ Benrey didn’t want to tell Gordon why he had the stitches. Because then he would have to get into why he wasn’t really a security guard and how he was the “energy source“ Black Mesa was looking for. But Gordon would be able to figure that out himself in time. They were already getting close to Xen.  _

…

It started with a growing pain in his chest, and not the usual emotional pain of knowing he was getting closer and closer to his crush inevitably killing him. Then the soreness spread to his stomach, hands, legs,  _ everywhere.  _ The second he had stepped into the Lambda Complex he had to put a lot more effort into keeping his disguise as his body fought with him the closer they got to Xen. It wasn’t his home, no species truly belonged to Xen that now lived in there. But the sheer amount of energy in there was overwhelming and he could  _ feel  _ it slipping through the portals and effecting his body. 

“we should go home,” Benrey “joked”, in small hope that it would work, even if he knew it wouldn’t. 

Gordon was desperate.

Tommy just wanted to see his dad and dog again. 

Bubby just wanted to go the hell home, wherever his real “home” was. 

...Dr. Coomer knew, but he didn’t say anything. There was just a flash of pity in the old man’s eyes before his code fought with him as he pushed him towards urging Gordon to the next task. 

Benrey wished he could’ve turned around and left the reactor. But the aching pain spreading to his whole body told him he couldn’t. So he watched as they all jumped into the portal, tuning out the screams of the scientist getting attacked by the aliens invading through the portal. Gordon jumped first, he was the protagonist and had the HEV suit. Then followed Tommy, then Bubby, and then Dr. Coomer who gave one look back at his friend. Benrey balled his fingers into a fist, pulling his lips back into a slight snarl as the pain flooded him all over.

No use holding back. 

...what did Dr. Coomer say again?

“nothing ventured, nothing gained,” Benrey mumbled to himself, his fingers twitching as he dragged himself to the portal, feeling his disguise slip more and more before touching the portal with his twisted fused fingers. He remembered that moment well. The pouring energy of the Borderworld felt less like a campfire’s welcoming warmth and more like a sea monster’s tendrils wrapping around his arm and pulling him in. The last of Earth’s air and atmosphere brushed against the spreading stitches on his face, and he felt as they spread to his helmet like mold. Then there was the sharp and quick moment of agonizing pain as his body twisted and grew. He let out an inhumane screech as the blast of the portal deafened him and his body tore itself apart. 

~ \ | <> | / ~

“...where’s Benrey?” Gordon asked, before shouting and covering his ears at the deafening sound of the portal ripping through Xen and giving him his answer. He whipped his head around so fast that Benrey half expected his neck to crack, and Gordon took in the horrifying sight in front of him. 

Benrey was fucking  _ massive,  _ and had a dead expression on his face. The shadow on his helmet wasn’t nearly as dark as it was in Black Mesa, and Gordon could clearly see the stitches running from the guard’s right eye, and to his left ear. There were also some new stitches on an ‘X’ pattern going across his helmet. But that wasn’t all. There was a large glaring third eye right above and in between his two old ones. Everything else about the guard looks normal. It was mostly the face that had changed. 

“...yo,” Benrey said, voice monotone and face devoid of any emotion as he accepted it. He didn’t want to die, but it wasn’t his choice. The least he could do was put on a show instead of fight his coding and nature. 

~ \ | <> | / ~

Gordon wasn’t the only one on the science team who noticed how Benrey’s form progressively shifted and grew more alien as they continued through Xen. They first noticed the change once they got to the headcrab mother’s lair. Benrey was ominously floating around the island, and occasionally spitting out some sort of threat. Even from the distance Benrey was from them, Gordon felt a shiver go down his spine as he glanced at Benrey’s hands. They were no longer human, but instead just two large and clawed fingers with a single thumb, with a metal wristband on the wrists. He could also swear he saw a slight lump underneath the guard’s security vest, in the chest area. 

The changes continued as they progressed. Benrey’s legs twisted and looked almost inverted, and instead of feet were just pointed ends of his legs. Gordon spotted a slight red and orange glow from behind the stitches when he poked his head in, phasing through the wall of the strange cave systems Xen offered. Gordon could spot more and more razor sharp teeth as they went through each detail, more slight changes in the security guard. 

And despite how more and more alien and disgusting Benrey’s form seemed to get, whenever he made a threat or watched from afar, Gordon’s mind kept going back to the panicking security guard shoving themself in a corner and struggling to breathe just because they didn’t have their helmet. Gordon remembered just how awful he felt when he saw Benrey like that, and it felt bizarre seeing him now. But he never got enough time to think about it before Benrey came in to taunt or threaten the science team, or another alien would attack them, or even just the science team urging him to move further. 

They jumped from portal to portal, and Gordon was starting to feel nauseous. But he couldn’t stop moving forward. He needed to see Joshua again, and he promised to take everyone home and to get them out. 

…

He promised that to Benrey too. 

There was another deafening sound of the portal ripping through Xen before it dumped the science team in a completely bizarre area compared to the rest of Xen. It was a bunch of scrambled floating islands, with one massive portal in the middle with spires surrounding it. It looked… oddly beautiful, mesmerizing almost. 

“I’ve never seen… anything like this,” Dr. Coomer commented in awe, staring at the portal. 

“...yeah…” Gordon added, nodding before his attention got taken from the portal by Benrey, who was floating around the portal looking at it.

Either his glasses were dirty or Benrey looked sad. 

…

_ He promised to get Benrey out. To get him home, and something made Gordon feel like Benrey didn’t think of Xen as his home.  _

“It’s like a castle!” Tommy said, absolute wonder in his voice as he jumped to the next floating island, reminding Gordon of what he was supposed to be doing. 

“I… I wouldn’t call it that,” Gordon mumbled, following after Tommy and jumping from island to island, until they eventually got the portal. 

“It fills me with a joy and energy I’ve never known,” Bubby added once he landed on the portal’s island, running a hand along one of the spires. Gordon noticed how the red light reflected off of Bubby’s glasses, adding to the bizarre and eerie feeling of the whole situation. It made him tense. 

Benrey’s roar of “I’M GONNA FUCKING KILL YOU!” Ripping through the air didn’t help the situation. Gordon frowned heading that, and turned back to the portal. Before Dr. Coomer took his focus with a simple question:

“Gordon? Do you like video games?”

~ \ | <> | / ~

Calling the boss battle exhausting would equal to calling a full night at the gym working with no breaks just a little tiring. With each skeleton they shattered, with every time the science team had to launch Gordon, and every new area in the chambers they had to fight their way through Gordon wanted nothing more than to get it over with. He fell in the red liquid once he got back from the past, on his knees and panting. He was so, so tired. He groaned in pain as he felt Sunkist and Dr. Coomer help him up. 

“Thanks,” Gordon wheezed out,” shakily getting back to his feet and wiping off the liquid of his glasses so he could see Benrey better. 

Benrey wasn’t even touching the liquid anymore. His pointed and twisting legs were hovering above it. The hands seemed so much larger than they were before, and his arms felt off and uncanny. Speaking of arms, Benrey now had a twisting third one from his chest. Gordon could much more clearly see the red glow from behind the stitches weaving around Benrey’s 4 eyes perfectly. The stitches on the guard’s helmet had come loose, and seemed to be pulsing with life. It vaguely reminded Gordon of the weird floating aliens that shot the fire, and how whenever they came close their heads would split open in an X pattern and reveal their skull. Benrey’s guard outfit seemed to almost be torn to shreds, revealing what looked like a surgical scar carefully etched around the third arm, and a hole in his stomach with what looked like some sort of circular device connected to his body. 

And then Gordon noticed two things: All 4 of Benrey’s eyes were widened slightly full of some sort of conflicted emotion, and their body language was slouched and unsure. 

“...Gordon?” Tommy asked, getting off of the back of the massive dog and putting a hand on Gordon’s shoulder (something the man had done to him many times before). 

“...yes, Tommy?” Gordon asked, turning from Benrey (who was twitchy and surprisingly not doing anything; it looked like he was forcing his arms down to his sides uncomfortably) to Tommy. 

“We’re… we’re going to go home… right? All of us?”

Gordon paused at that comment, looking to each member of his team. He looked from the determined and worried Tommy, whose fingers were twirling Sunkist’s fur anxiously, to Bubby who smelled like fire and smoke, an expression complicated and unreadable on his face, and then to the sad and worried Dr. Coomer, who was staring right past Gordon, and at Benrey. 

“I’m not sure…” Gordon mumbled, following Dr. Coomer’s gaze to Benrey. The alien wasn’t looking at Gordon, but instead at the alien liquid he was avoiding. At his reflection. Gordon turned back to Dr. Coomer. 

“...how much time do you have left in the Forbidden Science?” Gordon asked, wanting to get this over with. He didn’t want to think about the cowering and panicking security guard he promised to get home. Because obviously that wasn’t Benrey anymore. 

“Not long Gordon, so we must hurry!” Dr. Coomer exclaimed, snapping out of the worried trance. Gordon frowned at just how excited Dr. Coomer sounded, but ignored it. Gordon gave one last look back at Benrey, his eyes focusing on the red and orange light emitting from the guard’s now open and exposed skull (so it was like one of those aliens). 

“So that’s his weak point,” Gordon mumbled out loud as it clicked in his head. He turned back to the tense and uncomfortable science team. “I have an idea. Do you think you can all keep him close to the ground and distracted?” Gordon said, smiling a little as each member of the science team nodded. 

“S-Sunkist is fast! She’s f-faster than a ha-hawk snatching a rabbit!” Tommy said, climbing back on Sunkist who let out a loud “boof!” and wagging her tail. 

“Well I’m stronger than anything here, so I sure as hell can,” Bubby said with a grin, closing his hand into a fish and fire erupting from his closed hand and smoking leaking through in between his teeth. 

“I can do anything like this, Gordon,” Dr. Coomer said, his moustache in a goofy smile like you’d see in a cartoon, before it suddenly fell and his voice went low. “I just hope you know what you’re doing.”

“...I think I do. Thank you guys,” Gordon said giving a thumbs up and watching as they all started to leave and dash towards Benrey, thankfully keeping low to the ground like he said. Gordon breathed a sigh of relief, before turning and dashing towards one of the alien trampolines. 

As the man dashed towards the closest jump boost, he couldn’t help but glance at his teammates. They were doing as instructed, and Benrey seemed to be falling for the bait. There were little to no skeletons, and the ones that were there were simply just hovering above Benrey’s kneeled form in the liquid not doing anything. Then Gordon noticed just how slow Benrey was acting as the science team played cat and mouse with him. Instead of using the energy balls, the sweet voice, or  _ anything  _ he was abusing before, he was just simply trying to punch or slam them against the wall.

But he wasn’t even trying. 

Gordon made it to the alien trampoline, and jumped as high as he could, using advantage of the low gravity and aiming his arm, flexing his arm and feeling it go red hot as he aimed at the red and orange light from Benrey’s exposed skull. 

…

He had such a clear view.

He saw as Benrey carefully watched where Sunkist was running, and then slammed his fist into the area behind her. He saw as the third hand narrowly missed Bubby, purposely letting it get set on fire. He watched as Dr. Coomer punched and fought against the hand loosely holding him. Benrey was hunched over in a position that made it so perfect for Gordon to shoot at his weak point. 

_ Benrey was desperately grasping at the top of his exposed head as he stumbled around the room, trying to spot the stupid helmet.  _

It was so easy, and so perfect. Gordon could feel himself shaking just as much as Benrey was. He could hear a faint hum from the guard so far below him, gray orbs of light circling himself and filling up the area. 

_ “A shade of gray means that he’s afraid!” He heard Tommy point out.  _

The devil gun mode of the arm was starting to burn from how tense Gordon was and for how long he was holding it. Gordon watched as Benrey’s head turned to him, his wide eyes locking into Gordon’s unsure ones. Gordon immediately knew what Benrey’s expression meant. Benrey had given up and accepted this a long while ago, hadn’t he? His eyes and trembling form practically screamed “ _ what are you waiting for? Just some bullets and it’s over. You can go home.” _

He promised  _ everyone  _ they would make it home. 

Gordon felt himself start to slowly fall as he narrowed his eyes at Benrey, who now watched him with pure confusion and shock. Gordon stumbled when he landed back in the water, and looked up at Benrey’s towering form and back at the stunned science team. The whirring of his arm went silent as the gun cooled down.

“...I can’t.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoy this I’m tired lmao


End file.
